TU Dresden has issued the Statutes for Ensuring Good Scientific Practice, Avoiding Scientific Misconduct, and Handling Violations. All members and staff of TU Dresden are obliged to follow these statutes, to make them the basis of their scientific work and to actively contribute to the avoidance of scientific misconduct within their sphere of activity.

The ombudsperson is the contact person, advisor, and mediator in all cases of suspected scientific misconduct. If necessary, he or she will be supported by the Review Board for Scientific Misconduct.

Your report will be treated confidentially. Confidentiality serves to protect the whistleblower as well as the person suspected of misconduct.

The ombudsperson shall maintain a regular exchange with the liaison officers of the faculties, the Review Board for Scientific Misconduct as well as the other advisory bodies of TU Dresden. Conflict cases that are not related to scientific misconduct can be forwarded confidentially to the responsible offices of TU Dresden (e.g., Personnel Representation Council, conflict mediator of the Graduate Academy, psychosocial counselling, etc.) with the consent of the informant. 

If, in the view of the ombudsperson, there is reasonable suspicion of academic misconduct, it will be reviewed by the Investigative Committee or, in suspected cases where the misconduct relates to academic examinations (e.g. Bachelor's, Master's, Diplom examinations) or graduations (doctorates, habilitations), by the regular Examination Board provided for in the respective examination and graduation regulations.

In cases of suspected scientific misconduct, the Office for Good Scientific Practice  supports the ombudsperson, the Investigative Committee, and the regular review boards.

The Office for Good Scientific Practice accepts reports of suspected misconduct confidentially and provides information on possible procedural steps. This shall not affect the right of direct recourse to the ombudsperson or the Investigative Committee.

In cases of suspected scientific misconduct, the Office for Good Scientific Practice offers to check final theses (e.g. Bachelor's, Master's, Diplom examinations) or graduations (doctorates, habilitations) for plagiarism using plagiarism detection software.

Each faculty appoints one male and one female scientist as a liaison officer for early-career researchers. 

These are the first contact persons for early-career researchers at the faculty level. These liaison officers serve as contact persons that can be easily approached by early-career researchers (especially doctoral candidates) and who can mediate in problematic situations.

If necessary, and only with the consent of the person seeking advice, they can pass the conflict case on to the ombudsperson. This shall not affect the right of direct recourse to the ombudsperson. The Review Board for Scientific Misconduct is then informed of the conflict case.

The list of contact data is available here Vertrauenspersonen-der-Fakultaeten.pdf

Trained advisors and coaches of the Graduate Academy offer individual advice on "Good Scientific Practice" and on conflicts in the doctoral supervision relationship for doctoral students, postdocs and supervisors. Confidentiality is guaranteed and the approach is solution-oriented and appreciative. If necessary, contact will be established with other supporting offices at TU Dresden. The Graduate Academy's offer includes mediation with all parties to the conflict participating. The counseling sessions and mediations can also take place in English.

The Graduate Academy regularly organizes introductory courses on good scientific practice for doctoral students and offers subject-specific workshops for Master's students and doctoral candidates. The list of contact data is available here Good scientific practice course leaders

The Graduate Academy provides a "Good Scientific Practice" e-learning tool exclusively for its members and free of charge.

On the Graduate Academy's websites, you can find the training and consulting options on Good Scientific Practice here and on Conflict Counseling and Mediation here.

The supervision agreement is intended to optimize the framework conditions for doctoral studies at TU Dresden. It ensures the high standards of academic education at TU Dresden. The aim of this agreement is to regulate the specific rights and obligations regarding the cooperation between the doctoral candidate and the supervisory team, based on the doctoral regulations. The agreement provides transparency for both sides and is particularly helpful in difficult phases to achieve a successful graduation result.

Supervision agreement

In the course of the scientific process, a large amount of data is generated. This research data can be generated by both qualitative and quantitative research, e.g. through interviews, surveys, experiments or observations, and can exist in analog or digital form including text documents, spreadsheets, logbooks, questionnaires, audio and video recordings, samples, collections, database content or protocols.

Long-term archiving of research data is a prerequisite for the traceability of scientific results. In addition, the data obtained is of interest for possible subsequent use. For one, this allows new knowledge to be gained. At the same time, the reuse of the data increases the recognition of the scientific work.

In order to specify the handling of research data in general, i.e. beyond primary data, TU Dresden has decided on Guidelines on the handling of research data at TU Dresden.

More detailed information of the Service Center Research Data is available here: https://tu-dresden.de/forschung/services-fuer-forschende/kontaktstelle-forschungsdaten

The authors of an original scientific publication shall be only all those who have contributed substantially to the conception of the studies or experiments, to the preparation, analysis, and interpretation of the data, and to the formulation of the manuscript itself, and who have consented to its publication, i.e., have shared responsibility for it.

Therefore, to justify authorship, other contributions by themselves are not sufficient, such as:

• Merely organizational responsibility for obtaining funding
• Provision of standard materials for examination or analysis
• Instruction of staff in standard methods
• Merely technical assistance in the collection of data
• Merely technical support, for example mere provision of equipment, laboratory animals
• Regular, mere surrender of data records
• Merely reading the manuscript without substantially participating in shaping the content
• Management of an institution or organizational unit in which the publication originated.

This type of support can be appropriately acknowledged in footnotes or in the preface.

Likewise, according to general opinion, an "honorary authorship" is not permissible.

Similarly, neither the position as an institute director and supervisor nor as a former supervisor alone justifies co-authorship.

The "Research Ombudsman" (appointed by the DFG) may be approached by all researchers, directly and independently of any connection with the DFG, for advice and support in matters relating to good scientific practice and its abuse due to lack of integrity. This applies in particular to advising individuals who have reported indications of scientific misconduct ("whistleblowers") and are thereby exposed to sanctions by other institutions. http://www.dfg.de/foerderung/grundlagen_rahmenbedingungen/gwp/ombudsman/index.html

The "Guidelines for Safeguarding Good Research Practice" Code of the German Research Foundation (DFG) was adopted by the DFG's general assembly on July 3, 2019, and entered into force on August 1, 2019. https://www.dfg.de/download/pdf/foerderung/rechtliche_rahmenbedingungen/gute_wissenschaftliche_praxis/kodex_gwp.pdf

The aim of the Code is to create a deeply rooted culture of research integrity in the German academic landscape. The 19 guidelines describe appropriate standards for scientific working and comment on them in a practice-oriented manner.

Universities and non-university research institutions are required to implement the guidelines to be eligible to receive DFG funding.

The Code "Guidelines for Safeguarding Good Research Practice" replaces the white paper "Safeguarding Good Scientific Practice", which was first published in 1998 and supplemented and updated in 2013.

Gemäß § 3 der Satzung der TU Dresden zur Sicherung guter wissenschaftlicher Praxis, zur Vermeidung wissenschaftlichen Fehlverhaltens und für den Umgang mit Verstößen sind die Hochschullehrenden verpflichtet mindestens eine Weiterbildung zum Thema gute wissenschaftliche Praxis zu absolvieren. Das Zentrum für Weiterbildung (ZfW) bietet dafür speziell für Professor:innen Weiterbildungen an.

Weitere Weiterbildungs- und Beratungsangebote des ZfW z.B. auch zum Umgang mit schwierigen Gesprächssituationen finden Sie sowohl bei den Angeboten für Professor:innen als auch bei den Angeboten für Beschäftigte.